Think back to elementary school in February. The arts and crafts activities for the week have come to a screeching halt and the valentines box is prepped with pink paper, maybe some bows, and it is dripping with colored Elmer's glue. This little card chest on the front of the desk is screaming donations and love, in a totally non-biased way. Every student gives at least one card to every other student. There is no worry about boys giving cards to boys or boys to girls.

So, it's Valentine's Day, and, once again, you find yourself alone. Instead of dressing in all black to mourn the loss of America's soul due to commercialism, renting all of the chick flicks in your local video store before any happy couples can get their hands on them or calling in to every radio show and requesting "Love Stinks," consider that being single is not a death sentence.

No one is chaining you to your couch and forcing you to eat those five gallons of Ben and Jerry's. Enjoying Valentine's Day - or not - is your choice.

With Valentine's Day nearly upon us, love is in the air - or at least marketers want us to think so. And not everyone is satisfied with the average teddy bear, box of chocolates or display of affection. Some people like to take it to the extreme, ranging from a publicized marriage proposal to attempted murder.As an aspiring psychologist, I'd like to offer a humorous psychoanalysis of the crazed lovers to soothe those who may feel scorned by St. Valentine and to ground those who will be spending the day on cloud nine.

Kids playing soccer in the park, small girls singing their hearts out at beauty pageants and a hopeful mother of three calling into a radio station to win a prize for her children are all manifestations of competition in our world.Our society encourages a little healthy competition to give us something to strive for; however, competition can go from normal to unhealthy when a soccer mom verbally abuses a referee for a bad call, when a pageant princess is chastised by her mother for hitting the wrong pitch or when that mother of three loses her life because of a ridiculous contest.

The university is sitting on a gold mine.Administrators are involved in negotiations with local companies to tap into a pocket of natural gas sitting below campus.

The same situation is occurring across Fort Worth as companies hurry to tap into the Barnett Shale, a natural gas resource that stretches through several Texas counties.

Companies hope to not only purchase mineral rights from the university, they hope to utilize unused space on campus as drilling sites.

Students and faculty were able to eat their lunches while watching dancers perform in a student choreography showcase Monday.Brown Bag Dance is sponsored by the dance honor society, Chi Tau Epsilon, and is produced entirely by students.

The informal dance recital is open to all dance majors and happens once every semester. The hour-long performance is open to all students and faculty.

Dance faculty members were not required to attend but many lined the first two rows to show their support, said Allie Stevens, a modern dance major and choreographer for the show.

The Universidad de las Americas, which has come under scrutiny for the closure and subsequent reopening of its newspaper, is garnering more unwanted attention. TCU's sister university has been placed under a yearlong warning by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, the agency that accredits both UDLA and TCU.

SACS, an American agency that accredits universities in 11 U.S. states and Latin America, gave the university its warning when UDLA filed a follow-up report after a 2005 affirmation of its accreditation.